


The Settling Dust

by DoodleKon



Category: World of Warcraft
Genre: Anduin is in a dark place, Angst, Depression, Despair, Everyone except Jaina is just in the background, Gen, Implied/Referenced Character Death, It doesn't get better here, LATER, OCs are just us players and have no lines, Spoilers to 9.1, Suicidal Thoughts, The death is in the past of the story, attempted suicide by cop, but it might, chains of domination, obviously
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-23
Updated: 2021-02-23
Packaged: 2021-03-13 21:53:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 934
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29657850
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DoodleKon/pseuds/DoodleKon
Summary: PLEASE READ THE TAGS. There be dark themes here.My take on the end of the storyline pressented in the trailer to 9.1. I want to write more and continue it, but I know myself so for now it's a standalone. And it doesn't end in sunshine and rainbows. It will be Jossed soon enough. Hopefully for something better than this.
Relationships: Jaina Proudmoore & Anduin Wrynn
Comments: 1
Kudos: 17





	The Settling Dust

**Author's Note:**

> So, no one's mentioning how they cut off his pony-tail. Why is no one mentioning they cut off his pony-tail? Look at him after the shimmer goes away. They cut off his fucking pony-tail.

He felt it instantly, like a gush of strong wind from his core, outward, leaving him cold, colder, and empty. It should have been a relief. The tears in his eyes threatening to pour out should have been ones of joy.

A well-timed strike of one of the champions’ swords gave him the chance to mask the sudden weakness of his limbs. He fell to his knees, thankful that they had left enough of his hair to cover his face. The armor he wore, now useless, felt ten times heavier. Jaina, whose pleads to his essence had never ceased, took the fall as an opportunity to once again attempt to bind him in place. 

“Anduin, please. I know you’re still in there. You have to be.” Her voice was pained, nothing but a whisper now, as if she too was losing faith in him. 

Good.

Sylvanas had finally won. She had managed to kill all hope in him, through the blood on his hands, through the despair of everything they had forced him to do, and feel. Through the look on her face as he was made to kill her, once the Jailer realized she was playing a different game. 

The Light had abandoned him, it had betrayed him. Especially now, setting him free, denying him the death he had craved for so long now. A true death. 

If the Light was not going to grant him peace, if the fates continued to punish him for his naivety, then he would have to find his peace on his own.

His grip on Kingsmourne tightened. It was fitting, that it would be his father’s defiled sword to assist him in ending his defiled existence. House Wrynn, and its innocent and infantile search for justice would die that day. The world would not be better for it, maybe, but he was too tired to care. He was so tired.

It didn’t take much to break Jaina’s spell. It was harder to steel his features into the nothingness they were supposed to convey. The fight resumed anew. The champions dealing their best blows because they had been told to. Jaina trying her best to restrain him. His body screaming in pain and exhaustion. 

The edges of his vision had started to gray. The sounds of the battle had started to drown. It wouldn’t be long now. A shiv to his side finally pierced his armor, and it shouldn’t have been enough, it should have felt like little more than a bee sting, but the acute pain made him falter for long enough to miss the swing of a mace to his back, and he was brought once more to his knees. He readied himself. There was no energy left in him to get up. Just a bit more. A few blows more, and it would be over.

The blows never came. 

Dazed and barely able to focus his vision, he lifted his gaze to his would be executioners. They had all taken a step back, their faces turned away from him, focused on something, on Jaina? Anduin squinted, panting, trying to force his eyes to work properly. Jaina was standing a few ways away, her eyes focused on someone new, a few people actually, that hadn’t been there before. He could make out enough to recognize Thrall, Baine and Bolvar. The rest blurred indistinctive. Jaina’s eyes turned to him, wide with surprise and… fear.

“Anduin?” Tentative, soft, tender.

A spark of anger pierced through the emptiness that had consumed him. He gritted his teeth. This was not the defeat he craved. He just couldn’t win. It was the anger, and the desperation, who granted him the strength to rise once more, Kingsmourne clashing hard against the shield of one of the champions.

“Useless…” clang, “You are all” clang “useless!” clang.

As a mockery of his previous life, a flash or purple accompanied the last strike, causing the champion to fall backwards, on his ass. The rest of them had stepped further away, looking confused. He could kill the one on the ground, cross that line and ensure his own fate. He could. It would be so easy.

Kingsmourne fell from his hand, the anger leaving him. There was nothing to take its place. It was useless. He was useless.

The champions parted to let Jaina through. The grief that had been plastered on her face for the duration of the fight had been replaced by something else; mistrust, doubt, maybe. She approached carefully, and the closer she got the clearer it was. Hope, on her face, there was hope.

Anduin would have laughed, if he’d still been capable of such a thing.

For the third time, Anduin fell to his knees. He considered doing it himself. There was no power stopping him from picking up Kingsmourne and just ending it himself; not anymore. The blade had enough blood on it. It really would be fitting. 

Jaina knelt in front of him, eyes downcast, and slowly begun undoing the fastenings of his armor. Every piece of metal that hit the floor sounded like deafening thunder in his ears. Everything else was unnaturally quiet. 

“It’s over now. You’re free.”

The words left his mouth before he even thought them, raspy, matter of fact.

“We were never free.”

A hand on his cheek, soft, cool, loving. It was disconcerting. He didn’t pull away. 

“We will get you back, I promise you.”

It was a lie. There was nothing left to get back. He should have told her. He should have told her the truth. He really shouldn’t have believe her.


End file.
